Well, it is my spring break, and it is actually, miraculously, starting to look like spring in Minnesota. Temperatures are crawling up toward fifty degrees, everything is melting into a disgusting but welcome slush that means soon we’ll see some green. I have shed my heaviest down jacket for my lightest (because, yes, in Minnesota, one has to own several).

It is not yet spring here, not quite, but I wouldn’t say it’s still winter either. It’s the strange, slushy middle ground, we might call wing or sprinter, both of which seem kind of appropriate, actually, with their connotations of flight, of speed, of ease.

This stew is an ideal wing/sprinter dish; it would be fine in either winter or spring, too, but really, it’s perfect for this in between period, when you still want something warming, but not too bone-sticking. This is a meal that not only tastes like a breath from another land (particularly welcome when one is staycationing), but also will make you feel good about yourself, virtuous.

Everything in here is good for you, but not in a holier than thou way. Just in a simple, matter-of-fact goodness way, all the more enhanced by the addition of preserved lemons at the end. Their rich perfume really can just envelope you. Try to make this stew a day ahead (or at least try to have some leftovers the next day) to experience their full power.

Moroccan Chickpea and Squash Stew

Serves 6 to 8

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen, originally from Aida Mollencamp

Note: Try to make this at least one day ahead; the perfume from the lemons will be otherworldly after sitting and melding for a day.

Note: I’ve suggested you hold off on adding seasoning until the end; this is because the preserved lemons and olives are pretty salty, so I think it’s best to adjust things after they’ve been added.

Ingredients

- 2 Tbsp. olive oil

- 1 medium yellow onion, small dice
- 4 medium cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 2 teaspoons ground cumin
- 1 (3-inch) cinnamon stick
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 1 butternut squash, a little more than 1 lb.
- 3/4 pound red potatoes, large dice
- 2 cups low-sodium chicken or vegetable broth
- 2 cups cooked chickpeas, drained
- 1 (14-ounce) can diced tomatoes, with juices
- 1/2 preserved lemon, finely chopped
- 1 cup brined green olives
- Steamed couscous, for serving
- Fresh cilantro leaves, roughly chopped, for garnish
- Toasted slivered almonds, for garnish
- Plain yogurt, for garnish
- Hot sauce of your choice (for serving)

1. Prep butternut squash: You want to end up with about 1 lb. of large dice. I find it totally death-defying to try to peel raw butternut squash and dice it. So, the easy way out is buying pre-peeled and cubed butternut squash (you can get it at TJ’s). The slightly harder but much cheaper (and less death-defying) way is soften the squash up a little first, so that it’s easier to deal with. To do this, first cut off the top; then, carefully, cut the squash in half lengthwise; scoop out the seeds; place in a small baking dish with a little water; microwave for a few minutes, until beginning to soften. Then  it should be easier to peel the squash, with a sharp paring knife. Then, you can cut it up into cubes.

2. Now, get cooking! Heat olive oil in a large pot. When hot, add onion, garlic, cumin, and cinnamon stick. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are soft and translucent and spices are fragrant (but not burned!).

3. Add squash and potatoes and give a stir. Cook just until tender, about 3 minutes.

4. Add broth, chickpeas, tomatoes (and juices). Bring everything to a boil, then cover and reduce to a simmer. Cook until squash is fork-tender, 10-15 minutes.

5. Remove from heat and stir in preserved lemon and olives. Add salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Serve over couscous, with lots of little bowls of delightful garnishes.

I have not bought lunch a single day this semester. I am on campus for lunch four, or sometimes five, days a week. This is a difficult proposition, but I have been adamant. For one, I don’t really have time. But, more importantly, for two: I don’t really have the inclination. I think the situation may be worse in a location that is crawling with thousands of undergrads (pizza, anyone? and…more pizza? and subs), but maybe you experience this problem, too. Lunch is often time-consuming (lines); not really what you want anyway (pizza); not that healthy (most anything take-out); and very often quite expensive, at least for what you’re getting.

Hence, my fervency about bringing my own lunch. This isn’t always a perfect system; sometimes it ends with me bringing a sad little jar of soup and coming home ravenous at the end of the day. Those aren’t the good brown-bagging days.

This chickpea salad, though. This made for some good brown-bagging days.

I got the idea for this after eating at a new Indian/Nepalase restaurant, where they served us a warm chickpea salad as a free starter. All of the food was delicious, but as my dining companion noted, there are only so many ways to improve on palak paneer. This chickpea dish, on the other hand, was something entirely new, and was one of the best — or at least most memorable — things we ate.

It wasn’t chana masala, but what was it? I may never know, or at least not until I return and inquire. (Any ideas would be appreciated!) Instead, I thought I’d make my own version. For some reason, I thought I’d be able to replicate the dish. This chickpea salad, in fact, comes nowhere close, but is super delicious in its own right — where the restaurant version was complex and thickly spiced, this version has a freshness and a purity to its flavors that is equally enticing, and maybe actually better for a workaday lunch, when it’s not in your best interest to be lulled into a food/spice coma.

I had all these ingredients in my fridge/pantry; that’s why this came together exactly as it did. You could substitute lemon (or maybe even vinegar) for lime; other chilies for the jalapeños; cilantro for parsley; other onion-family members for red onion; other vegetables (red bell pepper?) for tomatoes. Really, this should require minimal thought and minimal effort, for maximum satisfaction.

The result is kind of like a chickpea tabbouleh, but with the flavors pumped up a bit. I had to restrain myself from eating the whole thing immediately, in order to have any for my week’s lunch.

This would go well with any number of grains, but particularly well with quinoa. I threw some salad greens in my tupperware for good measure. And, in no time, lunch becomes something to look forward to again.

Chickpea Salad with Lime and Jalapeño

Makes 2 lunch-sized servings, with grains and lettuce

Ingredients

- 1 15-oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed

- juice of 1 lime

- 1/2 red onion, chopped fine

- 1-2 jalapeños, seeded (carefully!) and minced

- 1 good handful parsley, chopped

- 1-2 tomatoes, chopped

- extra-virgin olive oil

- salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1. Combine all ingredients in medium-sized bowl. (Combine everything except olive oil first, then glug in as much olive oil as you want.) Add salt and pepper to taste. Will keep, in a tupperware, in the fridge, for at least a few days.

One of the major benefits of friends that enjoy talking about food just as much as I do: the recipe exchange. We’ve all got our go-to recipes, our oh-my-I-can’t-be-bothered-with-a-recipe recipes.  My friend’s is curry. Excuse me?! Curry is something this Texan grew up eating OUT – that insane concoction of spices surely takes even the greatest cooks hours of grueling, backbreaking, sweat and tears. This, for years, had been my assumption. It was too hard. Alas, a dish meant only for special occasions.

What I learned from my wonderful friend is that curry, a basic one, ain’t that hard. Combine the basic ingredients and let your culinary-heart lead the way.

This recipe is especially close to my stomach because I have experimented with the original recipes so much that I feel as though it is my own. Plus, it makes for a fantastic un-boring lunch, so I encourage the big pot! The great thing about this recipe – I admit that it is an adaptable version of curry – is that you can change up the ingredients, depending on what you have.

It should be noted that most people add garam masala. I have excluded that from this recipe because it is one of those more extravagant spices that I opted to try without, and it worked. However, if you choose to add it, keep it equal parts curry powder. Now, experiment, go crazy.  We’ve got years of non-curry making to make up for.

I also thought that I would use this opportunity to make a plug for dried beans. I purchase mine in the bulk section of my local health food store (ahem, whole paycheck). They are much cheaper, contain no added sodium, and taste better. Chickpeas should be soaked overnight. To cook, cover the beans in water, bring to a boil, and then simmer for about 40 minutes or until softened. I used about 10 ounces of dried beans, which yielded approximately 20 ounces once cooked.

A Basic Curry

2 tablespoons olive oil (any vegetable oil can be substituted)
1 yellow onion, minced
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons curry powder
1/2 teaspoon fresh ginger (double for ground ginger)
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon cumin
salt and pepper
1.5 cups water or broth
12 ounces of chick peas
(from here on down, add whichever vegetable you like – this is what I tried this time)
1 large potato, chopped
1 bell pepper, chopped
1 cup broccoli

1. Heat the oil over medium heat in a large pot. Add onion and garlic, stirring occasionally until brown. Stir in curry powder, ginger, cayenne pepper, and cumin until the onion and garlic is evenly covered.
2. Add potato, chickpeas, and water (or broth); bring to a boil.
3. Simmer until potato is almost thoroughly cooked.
4. Add bell pepper and broccoli.
5. Add salt and pepper to taste, and additional spices if necessary. Once veggies and chick peas are softened, you’re done!

Serve over warm rice.

I love cookbooks. I collect cookbooks. Sometimes, I read cookbooks in bed before going to sleep. I have been gratified in recent months to realize that a number of people also treat cookbooks as literature, but then I had this realization: I was only using them as literature.

Somehow, despite having already accrued 34 cookbooks here in Minneapolis (in addition to the maybe more than 100 I have at home in Berkeley), I never cook out of cookbooks anymore. Blame the internets. Somehow, somewhere along the way, cooking out of a book became a rarity for me, and one that seemed like a greater undertaking than pulling a recipe from the world wide webs. This was, of course, totally irrational: recipes from cookbooks don’t, by definition, take any more effort than recipes from the internet, plus most of the recipes I get from the internets came from books originally.

So, I decided to reacquaint myself with my cookbook shelves, beginning with this wonderful, Wonderful stew from my beloved, Beloved Jamie Oliver.

I love Jamie Oliver, and whether it is cool to love him or not, I don’t know, but I credit him with the beginnings of my interest in cooking. Well, him and my mom (who truly deserves the credit), but Jamie is the one who taught me that you don’t have to measure most things, that you don’t have to pull parsley or cilantro leaves off the stem, and that you can juice a lemon directly into a dish, using your fingers to catch the seeds.

His books are beautiful and lush, brimming with beautiful dishes that frequently avoid exact recipes, providing guidelines instead. And, most recently, he is doing really, really good work with school lunches and the obesity epidemic in America. And he has a show about all that coming out on abc! He is my hero.

He is my hero because of all the extra-good stuff he does, but he wouldn’t be able to do all that extra-good stuff if he hadn’t laid a foundation of really really delicious food. A Jamie Oliver recipe has never done me wrong, and this stew was no exception. Hearty, smoky, and easy-peasy, to last for days and only get better as leftovers (smokier, more complex). This is like a really upgraded chili, all the more classed up with chopped hardboiled egg as a garnish, for a little contrast. Go make it, tonight, from my cookbook to your computer, and perfect for this inbetween time of year that’s not quite winter and not quite spring.

Chorizo and Chickpea Stew

Adapted from Jamie’s Dinners

Serves 8

Ingredients

-       6 oz. chorizo sausage, chopped

-       1 onion, peeled and chopped

-       1 clove of garlic (or more!), peeled and finely chopped

-       2 sticks of celery, chopped

-       2 bunches (maybe 1.5 lb) spinach, washed and chopped

-       1 – 28 oz. can tomatoes, with juice (either pre-diced, or you can chop them; also, JO calls for fresh tomatoes here, but it’s winter in Minnesota, and so that’s just not happening)

-       1 – 28 oz. can chickpeas, drained

-       5 cups chicken stock

-       2 oz. prosciutto (or Spanish ham)

-       hard boiled eggs

-       olive oil

-       salt and freshly ground pepper

1. Heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil in a large pot. Add the chorizo. Cook for a few minutes until fat is rendered, then add onion, garlic, and celery. Reduce heat and cover, cooking for about 15 minutes (without coloring the onions, though no harm will really befall you if they get a little brown).
2. Add spinach, tomatoes, chickpeas, and chicken stock. (Add more chicken stock or water if you think you need more liquid.) Bring to a boil, then lower heat and let simmer for about 40 minutes.
3. You don’t have to (but I did): Remove about a third of the soup and puree it in the food processor. This will make things more stew-y, rather than soup-y. Return puree to pot and give everything a stir. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4. Remove from heat. Stir in prosciutto and 2-3 tablespoons olive oil.
5. Serve with grated (or finely-chopped) hardboiled egg on top.

Hummus: A Middle Eastern dip or spread made from mashed chickpeas. Delicious, cheap, and easy, typically purchased in supermarkets (a flaw that is to be remedied today). Most commonly spelled in Turkish as humus, though this spelling is to be avoided in English for fear of confusion.

Humus: The degraded organic material in soil, sometimes causing the layers of soil to be different colors (brown or black). Of the earth.

These two words, only an ‘m’ apart from each other, are not so very far apart at all. What is a more elemental, more earthy, more organic (not in the vs. conventional sense) food than hummus? For whatever reason, to me, making hummus feels like a deeply primeval act, and I am not alone: much folklore names hummus as one of the first prepared foods in history, dating back to at least the 12th century. Even then, they realized what so many of us ignore today as we buy our containers of Sabra (if you must buy hummus, you must buy Sabra): hummus is easy, it’s inexpensive, it’s infinitely customizable (if you make it yourself), it’s filling, and — despite its relative healthiness (debate the merits of good vs. bad fats here) — it feels disproportionately luxurious, considering its main ingredient is chickpeas.

As with almost all things, homemade hummus is infinitely better than store-bought. You can’t even imagine how much better, unless you’ve had really really excellent hummus at a Middle Eastern restaurant and wondered how theirs was so good. In all likelihood, there was no special trick, it was just because they made it themselves. And you can, too. In about 5 minutes, plus 2 minutes to clean the food processor after.

This recipe comes from Elise at Simply Recipes. I was going to use dried chickpeas, but she said that she has used both dried and canned and actually liked the texture of the canned much better. Since I’m nobody to argue with Elise, and since she was actually recommending the considerably more convenient option, I quickly gave up my plan. (Someday I will test this on my own and get back to you.) As for the other ingredients, you want them to be good, particularly the tahini. I got mine in bulk at the local co-op and told the woman next to me that I was making hummus for the first time while I scooped it into my jar. “Oh,” she said to me approvingly. “You’ve made the right choice. This is the only tahini I ever use. It makes such a difference.” Again, as I am in no position to argue, having never made hummus before, I would advise you to follow this co-op stranger’s wisdom. The tahini I bought there tasted richly of sesame and was a beautiful dark brown color, nothing like what I saw in the jars. In a pinch, however, I’m sure the jars will do. As for olive oil, I just used my same old TJ’s extra-virgin. I don’t think you need to go too gourmet on that.

This recipe makes a decently garlicky hummus; you may want to taste it when it’s all blended together before adding more. (I love garlic as much — probably more — than the next girl, but this was enough for me.) You could also add any number of other flavors: roasted red pepper and basil are two that I see a lot in the supermarket, but use your imagination.

As for the texture, I wanted mine to be on the lighter, fluffier side (this is the joy of making homemade hummus after all), and ended up adding more water and olive oil than the recipe stated. I’ve left the basic recipe below, though, so you can decide for yourself. If you do want to thin it, it’s not an exact science; just don’t put in too much (no more than 1/4 cup) of either olive oil or water at a time before whizzing it again and checking out the results.

Serve with tabbouleh, or any number of other dishes. Or, and this homemade version is good enough, you may just find yourself eating a spoonful of it plain.

Note: this recipe makes A LOT of hummus. Like, hummus out your ears. You may want to halve it, though the googles say that you can freeze hummus fine, so I may try that next time around (and report back, as well).

Hummus

Adapted from Simply Recipes

Makes about 3 cups

Ingredients

• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 28-oz cans of garbanzo beans (chickpeas), drained and rinsed
• 2/3 cup of tahini (roasted, not raw)
• 1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1/2 cup water (or more)
• 1/4 cup olive oil (or more)
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• Optional garnishes: Pine nuts (toasted or untoasted), olive oil (drizzled over), za’atar (sprinkled over)

1.  In a food processor, combine the garlic, garbanzo beans, tahini, lemon juice, 1/2 cup water, and olive oil. Process until smooth. Add salt, starting at a half a teaspoon, to taste. Add more water and/or olive oil to achieve desired texture.

2. Spoon into serving dish and add any or all garnishes (other options abound, as well). Will keep in a tupperware in the fridge for…well, now going on two weeks. So two weeks, at least.